Friday, November 30, 2012

"Original Batmobile for sale for the first time"

From The History Blog(!):

The
first and some would say greatest of all Batmobiles, the one that
started it all, is going on sale for the first time at the Barrett-Jackson auction in Scottsdale, Arizona, on January 19th, 2013. This is the iconic Batmobile made by legendary car customizer George Barris for the 1966 Batman
television series starring Adam West in the title role. It still has
all the Batgadgets even the most covetous and demanding of comic nerds
could wish for and a pre-Bat history that the most covetous and
demanding of car nerds could only dream of.

It started its life in 1955, a one-off Lincoln Futura concept car.
Designed by Ford’s lead stylist Bill Schmidt who was inspired by manta
rays and a mako sharks he had seen while scuba diving, the Futura’s body
was built entirely at the Ghia Body Works in Turin, Italy, in 1954 and
affixed to an experimental Lincoln Mark II chassis made three years
before the first Mark IIs were sold. The car was 19 feet long, seven
feet wide, and just
4.4 feet high with a double, clear-plastic bubble top, huge
outward-angled tailfins on the back and front sides, a wide oval grill
to give it that shark-mouth aggressive look and all kinds of newfangled
technology like push-button transmission, warning lights and speedometer
(among other indicators) housed in the steering wheel, and a circular
rear antenna that also served as a microphone to pick up and amplify
traffic or horn sounds from any car behind them to the driver and
passenger inside the bubble canopy....MORE